Fusion Fusion
by The Masked Crusader
Summary: Steven finds a gem thing on the beach, takes it home, and it freaks Pearl out. Then he and Amethyst mess with it. It tries to escape. Garnet goes after it, it activates, and adventure ensues.
1. In Which a Hostile Fusion Occurs

**This is how this story happened:**

 **I was sitting on my bed, thinking, "I really haven't written in a while. I should probably do that today." But I wasn't feeling up to White, and I thought, "Surely there's another thing you're fond enough of to fanfiction about." So I pulled out the cartoon which I only recently found myself in the ever-constricting grasp of-Steven Universe. Brutally honest, I had no concept of where this was going. I was just there, staring at unfinished sentences thinking, "What's in the bucket? What's in the bucket?" and looking around my room for random objects. Nonetheless, I have excreted this. And now you're going to read it and like it, gourd-dank-it.**

* * *

A splash of cold ocean spray wet Steven's face as he sprinted across the beach. He held a plastic bucket in one hand. He had to shove his free hand into the pail to keep its contents from bouncing out. Wet sand stuck to his shoes, slowing him down.  
"Pearl! Garnet! Amethyst!" He yelled the name of his three Crystal Gem roommates of sorts when he approached their shared house: a humanoid, feminine statue carved into a cliff face. Their living space was hollowed-out and furnished inside.  
It took him longer than he wanted to arrive within speaking distance of Pearl, who'd rushed outside and down the front deck's stairs to meet him. "Steven! What happened? You sound distressed!" In truth, though, she was more frantic than he was.  
"Look what I found!" Steven held up the pail, ready to display its foreign contents.  
"Ooh!" Amethyst appeared behind his back, almost out of nowhere, and grabbed the thing right out of his bucket. "Steven's got a fan."Pearl slowed to a walk. "A...fan?"  
"Yup! But's it's a really cool fan." It was almost like a tiny helicopter, made of a stone tube with two sets of five blades attached to the same side. The rock was studded with itty bitty purple crystals the same hue as the blades. Both Steven and Pearl directed their eyes to Amethyst's.  
"What?"  
"Is it yours?"  
"It is your color." Steven's question was innocent, but Pearl's response seemed rather serious for the situation.  
"I don't know." Amethyst shook the object, first gently, then vigorously up and down. "It doesn't do anything."  
Pearl glanced back at the house. "Oh, Garnet's off on...business...so we can show her when she gets back. Until then, we're keeping it safe inside."

Amethyst was just finishing complaining about her boredom to Steven, the both in them sprawled on their grungy couch, when Pearl returned. She'd stored the fan somewhere in her own room.  
"What's the big deal?" Steven asked innocently. "It might not even be gem stuff."  
"There were gems on it," Amethyst replied.  
"Yes, and the way things have been going, that's plenty to make it potentially dangerous, even a weapon." Pearl paced anxiously for seconds before turning stiffly to the two smaller gems. "I have to go find Garnet. She's not too far away, and I know she'll be able to figure out what this is." That was all they heard of her before the warp pad whisked her away.

Moments after she vanished, Steven questioned her. "You ever feel like she doesn't like us sometimes?"  
"It's just Pearl." She waited a few seconds before leaping off the couch. "Let's get in her room!"  
"I don't know-she looked kind of like she wanted us to stay here-" Before he finished, Amethyst's gem-studded whip was around him and they were making their way through the universal gate, beyond which was a number of interchangeable rooms.

Amethyst did most of the searching as Steven more or less gaped at Pearl's residence. He'd seen it a few times before, but that didn't mean he was at all used to its cavernous structure, and primarily decorative waterfalls. It was to be expected that Amethyst would uncover the fan.  
"Hey, Steven! Ready to see what it does?" Steven left behind his inhibitions in favor of curiosity. And in favor of spending fun time with Amethyst.  
"We should do it-together," he said, putting on his noblest face.  
"Ready." She put a finger on one of the sets of blades, and Steven copied her on the other. "Go!" The blades spun with a flick.  
They both let go when the fan started vibrating vigorously. It hovered there before drifting aimlessly about the room and eventually out the door.  
Steven chuckled and followed it. "Cool! It's like a little helicopter!"  
Amethyst ran after him, soon overtaking him while she produced her crystal whip from her gem. Once they were down on the beach, she snapped it forward and around the device. "I got it-whoa-ooh..." Instead of the gem grounding the fan, the fan lifted the gem. Amethyst dangled by her rope, being lifted steadily higher.  
"Oh, no! Amethyst!"  
"Don't worry, Steven," she called back. "I'm good. Catch me!" The whip dissolved, and Amethyst landed on her face in the sand. Not long after, they heard the screen door slam open. Pearl frustratedly marched out, followed by the tall figure of Garnet.  
"I can't even leave you alone for five minutes! Amethyst, did you put him up to this?"  
"Put him up to what? It's not like he got hurt."  
"He very well could have. We have no idea what that thing is-where is it?!"  
Steven thrust a finger toward the sky over the ocean, where the copter was still making its journey.  
"It...flies?" Pearl's expression melted from an aggressive to a more awestruck distress. "Garnet...do you think it could be...the cable?"  
Without a word, Garnet bounded into the air, snatching the rogue thing out of the sky in one gauntlet. Steven expected her to plummet into the sea, but she stayed frozen in the air.  
Pearl's eye widened in dread. "It was...Amethyst! Did you touch that thing with your weapon?"  
"I didn't know what it was!"  
"What's going on!" Steven interjected with equal volume.  
"I'll tell you when we have time. We need to get away from here!" Steven's hand nearly popped right off as Pearl gripped it and commenced their escape. He looked back to see Amethyst frozen too, perpetually staring at the sky and the levitating Garnet. Then his field of view was overtaken by the dark cliff face.  
"Why not just back in the house?" Steven asked, still incessantly curious.  
"It wouldn't hold. Steven, we've dealt with Sugilite before-"  
"Sugilite's coming back?!" Despite knowing somewhat how dangerous the fusion gem was, Steven's eyes still lit up with stars. As if to answer him from afar, there came a long, loud, scratchy laugh from where they'd left the other two.  
"Yes. She's a fusion of the way Amethyst hates orders and the way Garnet doesn't take orders..."  
"But you got her last time!"  
"We got lucky. Her flail hit her on the head." The ground shook from that fist-shaped flail materializing and smashing into the beach.  
"YOU READY FOR ROUND TWO, PEARL? STEVEN? WHERE'D YOU HIDE?"  
"She's coming," Pearl warned. "Would it be best to fight her now? Preferably we should get her away from the city...No she'd catch up. Steven, stay put." Her spear slid neatly from the gem on her forehead, and she left Steven dejected behind the rocks.  
It wasn't hard to hear the scrimmage between the gems. Pearl's voice was the only part faint and unclear. Whooshes and rumbles signaled swings of the fused weapon, and Sugilite's voice was bellowing enough to carry across the entirety of Beach City.  
"BETTER GET USED TO ME, BABY, 'CAUSE YOU AREN'T GONNA FOOL ME LIKE THAT AGAIN!"  
More wrecking ball noises. Finally, Steven peeped his head out. Luckily, Sugilite had her back to him.  
"YOU WANT ME TO UNFUSE! WHAT'S WRONG WITH HOW I AM?" Pearl ducked out the way of the bludgeon yet again, springing off her momentum to take a slice at Sugilite's chest and hopefully her gem. It only took one of her heavy arms to reflect Pearl into the ground. In doing so, their positions had switched, and Sugilite looked up from Pearl's beaten form for a second. "STEVEN! HEY, COME JOIN THE PARTY!"  
Nervous sweat immediately broke out on his face. He took the chance at giving Pearl some time and ran straight in, hoping for a bubble or a shield or anything.  
He skidded to a stop when the towering fusion brought down her flail. He barely saw Pearl look up before she vanished beneath its weight. Both he and Sugilite looked on at the tiny white stone now imbedded in the sand, one with petrified fear and one with monstrous pleasure. Steven ran for it, but a purple hand as big as he was awkwardly scooped it up first. "HOW 'BOUT IT, LITTLE MAN? JUST YOU AND ME."  
"No, I don't want it to be just you and me! I want it to be me and Pearl and-"  
"AND GARNET AND AMETHYST. LIKE I SAID, I'M HERE FOR GOOD THIS TIME!" Steven was still immobile from worry for Pearl, dread of Sugilite, and all-around hopelessness. "LET'S GO. THIS PLACE IS BORING." The wrecking fist disappeared like all gem weapons did, and the newly-free hand held Steven in its palm. He wouldn't have had an escape plan, but he still felt one of Sugilite's fingers bash him on the side of the head. Then he didn't feel anything.

* * *

 **There's line breaks where there shouldn't be and they won't go away. I already tried bribing them.**

 **Does anybody know how to write for Sugilite? 'Cause I sure don't. There was a lot of thinking involved. Hard thinking. She got the ten minutes of screen time, and that's what we all have to work with. Sheesh.**


	2. In Which Peridot Meets The Fusions

**I finally figured out where this is going! And my favorite gem in the whole wide show is here. Guess which one. Hint: It's not every gem that's not Peridot.**

* * *

"Log date: 702. This is Peridot. Readings of fusion cable reactivation have spiked." The face flickering on Peridot's screen glowered.

"Communications with Jasper have been unsuccessful. Do you know where she is?"

"Negative. The last time I saw her was before we lost the ship."

"Then I'm afraid you're the only ally we have on Earth. You'll have to track down the cable by yourself - unless you can convince one of the rebel gems to help?"

"They'd never listen," Peridot grumbled, crossing her arms.

"You'll be contacted if we can finally reach Jasper. We'll send her after you. Don't lose it." Yellow Diamond blurred and faded into static.

The edges of the screen disassembled and returned to Peridot's hand. She sighed heavily. "All by myself. Of course. Couldn't send a pod or anything."

She stood impatiently on the Kindergarten's warp pad until it lit up and sent her through the stream. She landed in a dim, humid jungle. It certainly wouldn't have been her choice to end up in such a wild place.

Unnatural crashes and thuds were pounding through the air from somewhere. It was time to buckle down and do the dirty work, Peridot thought. Her fingers on one hand orbited so fast they acted like a spinning saw. She cleared a path through the forest one hack at a time.

It wasn't long of this that Peridot came across a large depression in the ground. It was as long as she was tall, and there were more in a pattern leading away. Speaking of patterns, each dip contained a peculiar zig-zagged stripe pattern. Urgent anxiety shot through her when she all at once realized them to be footprints. Due to the context of the situation, they had to be those of a much larger gem, and a fusion at that.

Following the prints led her to a clearing - not in the sense that it lacked trees, but rather that the trees had been flattened. Forcefully. She refocused her attention from the ground to the cliff ahead of her.

Standing atop it was a truly frightening fusion. It held a limp human body in one of its four hands, and it had two others raised to the sea, almost delicately containing something in the cupped hands. The fusion let its prisoner free, and Peridot watched the fusion cable start to flutter off.

She exclaimed, and dashed up the cliff face. "Are you crazy!? Don't let that thing out!"

When she got close, it was clear the body grasped in the purple fusion's hand was the same one she'd met unpleasantly before-something called "Steven". She stopped right where she was when the colossus bent over to yell in her face, showing her mouth to be full of monstrously sharp teeth.

"WHADDYA THINK YOU'RE - PERIDOT!" Peridot's name was even louder than everything else, prompting her to take a few steps back. In the fusion's rage, it dropped the Steven flat on the ground. It groaned softly before sitting up. He also called out Peridot's name.

"Peridot! Run!" the Steven ordered. Peridot stayed put. "Sugilite's really strong, and she doesn't want to separate!"

"You can't just throw the fusion cable away! Who knows what else it'll touch!"

"IF YOU WANT IT SO MUCH, GO TAKE IT!" One of Sugilite's arms swooped in and nearly crushed Peridot in its fist. Then it hurled Peridot over the water.

She activated her propellor function again, steadying herself in the air and reaching out for the cable. She was just able to reach it, and she caught a look at Sugilite's face. The expression clearly said someone hadn't thought something through all the way.

Her flight had lasted for longer distances than an Earth ocean before, so she was content to find safe land that way. But from a distance, behind her, she heard the booming voice of Sugilite threatening the Steven.

"I DON'T LIKE HOW YOU TATTLED ON ME," it warned. "I THOUGHT WE COULD HAVE FUN OUT HERE, BUT I NEVER PROMISED TO LAY OFF YOU -"

Peridot got very and perplexingly tense at this, had an argument with herself, and growled at her own perceivable weakness. Still, she turned herself around and soared back to the beachside cliff. She let two of her free fingers hold the cable, and the other three whisked Steven out of Sugilite's potential grasp.

When the Steven removed its hands from its eyes, it immediately started with the questions.

"Peridot? But - why are you saving me?"

"It's not a big deal."

"But you're on the other side."

"I don't know, okay? You just...never tried to stop me by yourself. Why didn't you? I'm on the other side."

"You never tried to stop me."

"...Oh."

Peridot landed at the warp pad.

"Where are we going?" the Steven continued.

"Never mind where I'm going. Somewhere where I can get rid of this safely. But you're going home." With a sigh, she added, "Where you belong."

"You should come too!"

What?"

"I bet if Pearl saw me and you on the same side, she'd team up with us too! And then we could all beat Sugilite!"

Peridot scoffed. "No, she'd see me with you and assume I'm kidnapping you. That's what they all do. And I'd have to convince all three of them. Clods."

"Nope, just Pearl. Sugilite's a fusion of Garnet and Amethyst."

Her eyes widened with fear. "That's what happens when two of those gems fuse? I guess it is a three-way fusion...I'd hate to see all four of them fuse."

"I've seen it! They turn into a red-green-and-purple giant woman with six arms called Alexandrite. But she doesn't stay together easily especially while she's eating."

"O...kay..." Peridot put her face into the hand that didn't have an iron grip on the fan. "We can try to keep Pearl away from me. And we can try to take down a fusion that's taller than a house."

"Pearl did it all by herself last time. Well...I was keeping her going."

"All right, all right. Let's just go." She pulled the Steven onto the warp pad, and they both shot off to his home in Beach City.

}====={

"Why are you with Peridot!" Pearl was on the verge of picking Steven up and shaking him. The Homeworld gem in question stood off to the side, annoyed and just a little dejected.

"Because she saved me from Sugilite!"

"You wouldn't have needed saving if she hadn't shown up!" At this, Pearl turned her head to glare at Peridot again.

"That's not how it happened!" she shot back. "I tried to get the cable away from her, and Steven told me to be careful. Then Sugilite got mad at him for it. It wasn't my fault."

"Steven - oh, here she comes..." They all looked at the horizon, and saw the giant Sugilite stomping through the water just like she'd done the first time Steven saw her fused.

"I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU LEFT ME AGAIN! I CAN TAKE A HINT. YOU DON'T WANT ME!" she screamed, making waves with every footstep. In preparation, Pearl let loose an army of Holo-Pearls set to the highest level.

"Peridot, if you're going to help, you should ready your weapon."

"I'm wearing it."

"Your armor? That's not a weapon!"

"Neither is Jasper's helmet, but I didn't hear anyone complaining then."

"Guys!" Steven got between them. "She's here!"

One of her massive boots crashed onto the sand, and then the other. "COME GET SOME, PEARL! BUT DON'T GET TOO CLOSE!." She tilted her head back and laughed. Then she brought out her fist-shaped wrecking ball and swung it all the way into Steven's, Pearl's, and Peridot's midst. Peridot fell off-balance in escaping being crushed beneath it, and the cable flew out of her her hand. Then the flail displayed a new ability - it opened, the two giant gauntlets it was composed of lifting a huge amount of sand away like some kind of construction crane. Sugilte pulled the load back toward her, dumped in one of her hands, and held the fusion cable high in the air for everyone to see.

"COME AND GET IT!" Pearl ordered her holograms forward, and they simultaneously made their attacks on Sugilite's legs. "HEY! THAT'S NOT FAIR! COME FOR IT YOURSELF!"

While Sugilite was distracted kicking and backhanding the Pearls away, the real Pearl had already broken into a run and thrown her spear directly at Suglite's triangular shades. They flashed with reflected sunlight when she caught it right after she claimed the cable. "HEY, PEARL. WATCH THIS." Grinning with all her feral teeth, she tapped the spear against the cable.

"Oh, no..." Pearl grabbed Steven by the shoulders. "Steven, just get one of use out of there. It doesn't matter which one; you just have to distract her or shock her enough to lose concentration. I know you can do it, just don't fight us straight on -" With that last piece of instruction, Pearl froze in an expression of frantic distress, and Sugilite in one of roaring laughter.

"Steven?" Peridot said.

"They're all fusing...no, don't run! Alexandrite's not as crazy as Sugilite."

Pearl poofed into a short-lived white cloud, and her gem zipped magnetically to Sugilite. It orbited her petrified body once, then became nothing more than white fusion light. The same glow enveloped Sugilite, and her already towering form grew even more. The glow faded, revealing the even-taller fusion.

"Alexandrite..." Peridot said in fearful awe.

Steven expected her to quietly say something like sorry for being so out-of-control, or to just have the sense to unfuse right then. But she just stared down at him with her emotionless single-lensed sunglasses. The Holo-Pearls had stopped attacking, recognizing a new opponent.

"Do you wish to engage in combat?" they challenged in unison.

Alexandrite slowly lowered her face to about ground level. Her face lifted, letting her terrifying lower mouth shout, "NO!" All the holograms faded at once. The giant stood back up, second mouth still agape. She fired a continuous laser beam from that mouth. Its focus slid along the beach, making an arced path of glass as it superheated the sand.

Steven jumped in front of Peridot, his shield in front of him. He felt the impact as the beam met the barrier, but it was no worse than when he had to defend against the hand ship's laser weapon.

"Why are they firing at me!?" Peridot exclaimed from behind Steven.

"They just don't like you!"

"I knew it!"

Alexandrite cut her fire and began striding towards them.

* * *

 **Ooh, what's she going to do when she gets there? Will she leave them alone? Will she spare one but not the other? Will she attack both? Find out next time! Reveiw! Tell your Steven-Universe-oriented friends!**


	3. In Which the Fusion Culminates

**Wow, this was fun. I want to write more Steven Universe stuff now. On a different topic, I began this more than a week from when I uploaded it. Then Steven Bomb started. And I decided to just not continue til the week was over, because I had to keep rewriting things with new information. Like the entire premise of the ending. Everyone was just going to fuse all at once until they fell apart. But I had to work Sardonyx in. Oh, and Ruby's dialogue had to be changed. Because apparently she's pissed at everything, no matter what. But I bet the bomb kept you all occupied anyway.**

"I've never seen a four-way fusion before! Not one that worked, anyway..." Peridot was still crouched behind Steven, as he pulled down his shield. He kept it ready for defense again as the massive fusion stomped closer. "You said she wouldn't be as vicious!"

"I know! Nnngh, think!" Steven squeezed his face with his free hand. "Pearl said we had to shock someone out of her...Peridot!"

"What!"

"Fly around and distract her!"

"What!" Peridot repeated, though while readying her propellor-fingers. "I just flew across the ocean! You think these just have energy? If they did, I could just fly back to Homeworld-"

"Our lives depend on it!"

"Fine." Her propellor sputtered, but she managed to get her feet off the ground and rise. Steven called out for her to "go for the eyes," directing Alexandrite's chilling stare to her hovering target.

The last thing Steven saw of the diversion was Alexandrite materializing her weapon-a whip, wrapped around a handle for traction, which ended in a fist, holding a curved spear in each direction. A giant, multicolored pickaxe.

Still, he tore his attention away for the display and charged into the house. He summoned back memories of accidentally discovering places, exploring the temple, and then, he knew where he had to go.

He wouldn't get the real one. That would be a whole new problem to deal with. Instead of going to Garnet's room and below, Steven activated the multi-door and sete one foot beyond the gate and onto the shimmering pink clouds that made up his mother's room.

"I need-oh." The room read his mind and placed in his outstretched hand an amalgamation of gem shards. Five, it looked like. All were different colors and types, but all were forced without consent into a single rock. Or at least, it looked like it. It was really just a cloud, but the resemblance to the Cluster's gem was strong enough.

Fake gem in tow, Steven sprinted to Alexandrite, who was swinging her pick wildly at Peridot. Each time, it would make a sweeping breeze that threw Peridot off-course.

"Finally!" she yelled from her high position.

"This should get her!" Steven assured. "Alexandrite! Alexandrite, look at this!" The giant turned her head, and lost sight of Peridot, who puttered awkwardly to the ground.

"What's-oh!" Alexandrite shook with fear at the sight of the fused shard that flew by her face. "I can't-ah!" She dropped the cable, which she'd been holding tightly ever since she was Sugilite, and she fell apart.

Three shining forms flew apart and landed in separate places. Steven expected their light to fade and return to Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl, but three other gems appeared instead.

Opal, the less-giant-but-still-giant fusion of Pearl and Amethyst, didn't even hit the ground. She anded on her hands and gracefully backflipped to her feet. Two much smaller gems landed a good distance away from each other. Sapphire stood and brushed some sand off her dress, but Ruby leapt up in a panic.

"Sapphire?" The blue gem waved from her distance away, then accelerated supernaturally fast to Ruby's side. "Agh! I can't believe this! It's - it's - there's too much fusion! Everyone's fusing! This isn't right!" Ruby grabbed Steven's face and pressed all over it.

Sapphire narrated her odd action with, "I hope we didn't hurt you."

"Nope, I'm good," Steven replied, though muffled from Ruby's examination. Garnet's two halves hugged him in sync.

Peridot let out a long groan. "Can we cut the crud and get out of here? I don't know how to deal with this...stuff..." She gazed up at the sky-or rather, the thing in the sky.

Something on the boardwalk exploded. It was the victim of several of Opal's powerful light arrows.

"Opal?" Steven asked tentatively. "What are you doing?" Without notice, she continued bombarding the city with a storm of arrows.

"C'mon," Ruby ordered. She easily lifted Steven onto her back, and Sapphire dragged them both along at high speed. Before he knew it, Steven was back in the house, listening to Peridot's and Opal's disagreement.

"I'm saved!" Peridot jubilantly exclaimed, referring to the looming hand-shaped ship over the ocean. It was near identical to the one the Crystal Gems had had a bad experience with in the past, but as a right hand rather than a left.

"No you're not," Opal responded. Her voice was as calm as it ever was, but this time much more sinister.

"What's going on?" Steven asked, fear finally getting to him once Ruby set him on the floor. "Why's everyone so mean? I thought it was just Suglite being herself, and maybe Alexandrite was mad at Peridot, but now Opal's doing it-" Sapphire put a gloved hand over his mouth.

"Shh. We'll explain." Then she took Ruby's waiting hand and was tossed into the air, slipping a smile as she fell into the red gem's arms and spun in a dance. Ruby, though not breaking eye contact while she fused, said, "Great job with the cluster shard. Good idea," she finished in a whisper, and the two vanished. Garnet was left in their place.

"That's better," she said, sitting down cross-legged. "Ready, Steven?"

He plopped himself down and nodded once, eyebrows lowered in seriousness.

"Good. These fusions aren't normal-but they aren't like the cluster either. The fusion cable is an even older attempt by Homeworld to manipulate fusion. It can be activated after shutdown by motion of the propellors, and the fusion initiates when two gem weapons come in contact with it within a short time. If the gems aren't too far away, they'll immediately fuse." At this, she put a hand on her near-opaque visor. "But it's artificial. The fusions are extremely hostile, sometimes mindless. And they seek out more gems to fuse with."

Steven's mouth had fallen open as he heard the story, but he closed it to maintain serious levels. "So Pearl and Amethyst don't know what they're doing?"

"Possibly. I know I was awake in Sugilite. But you jut get caught up in it." They waited for a second, and Garnet said, "We need to get outside. Someone's here to see you.

With Opal firing incessantly at the hand ship and Peridot trying to flag it down, Garnet and Steven were free to sneak around to some obstructed areas of town. In the scuffle, someone knocked the cable into the air, and, under overload, it whizzed around erratically. Steven put up his shield to protect his face out of reflex, before even Garnet could notice and yell, "Steven, don't!"

"Oh..." He realized what happened. But he couldn't help feeling a little excited for what was to come. He was going to fuse with the Crystal Gems, and two of them at that. He wondered what a fusion of him, Amethyst, and Pearl would be like as he froze. People in town peeked over the wreckage, two of them being his dad and Connie. He would have liked to say something to them, but he was locked in place. Garnet kept them back. Then he lost all sensation for a while.

}====={

When he woke up, Steven was in chaos. All around him, metaphorically speaking, he sensed Amethyst and Pearl shouting at each other, and rampant emotions swirling about. Suddenly, they realized his arrival.

"Steven!" Pearl.

"How'd he get in!?" Amethyst.

"Amethyst, be careful where we're going-!"

"Don't tell me how- woah-oh!" Just like that, Amethyst was gone.

"You must have distracted her."

Steven's vision cleared a bit, and he began to see the real world again. Amethyst was getting to her feet, likely recovering from being fused for so long. She hadn't been out since they first found the cable. But Pearl was still somewhere around him.

"Regardless, Peridot has to - Steven, are we fused?"

Whatever eyes they were looking out of glanced at its respective hands. They were a dull lavender color, followed by tight blue sleeves, below which were purple leggings leading down to small pink shoes...

"What? What happened?" Steven tried to look frantically around, but Pearl looked with him.

"Steven...we can form Rainbow Quartz! This is incredible!"

"I can fuse with you too?"

"Oh, but I'll deal with it later. Right now, Peridot's open."

Suddenly, Steven remembered the story of the cable. Pearl was losing herself to the violence.

"That's ridiculous, Steven. I'm perfectly alright." But Rainbow Quartz advanced on Peridot, pink spear and white shield at the ready.

"No!" Steven yelled, but in Rainbow Quartz's voice. It sounded much like how his mother's had, but higher and almost happier. He strained against her hostile desires, and that conflict shattered the fusion.

Even having just separated, Pearl was all over Steven, saying, "Thank you so much for getting us out of there. I wasn't sure how much longer it would be before something really terrible happened - who did that?" she said, referring to the rubble in Beach City. "Opal? I did that?"

"Well, you and Amethyst."

Meanwhile, Peridot was jabbering into her finger screen, hearing and seeing Yellow Diamond behind it.

"We located Jasper and Lapis ourselves. Are you prepared to make contact?"

"Yes, why wouldn't I be?"

"Copy, but be ready." The hand dipped into the ocean and submerged itself. It didn't soon surface.

The Crystal Gems, plus Connie and Greg, had done their reunion.

"It's good that everyone's back safely," Pearl continually insisted.

"You guys?" Amethyst alerted, watching Peridot from a distance. "She's getting away." They had no choice but to follow Amethyst and catch the green gem before she escaped into space.

Peridot, unaware of their approach, bent down to pick up the cable, which lay forgotten in the sand. Amethyst threw a whip around her at a dash, sending Peridot's face into the same sand.

"You idiot clod! My fingers are part of my armor!"

"So?" Amethyst responded blandly.

"My armor is my weapon!" She and Amethyst dematerialized, and their lights and gems whirled around rapidly. The fusion gem didn't appear - rather, the glow it would come from pulsed and bulged in different places. It was having a hard time forming. At one point, a bit of Peridot's arm, now larger, poked out, holding five whiplike fingers in front of it. 'Whiplike' meaning they were me of Amethyst's whips studded with gems the same color red as the armor was. Then it fell back into the mass again.

Garnet caught the cable with two hands. "Pearl. Just shoot it."

She produced her spear from the gem on her forehead and warmed it up. A small but bright laser left its tip and struck the fan. Unluckily, the device was unfazed. Pearl and Garnet were stunned. Then their gems lit up.

The two met each other's eyes in dread.

"I'm sorry." Pearl took on a submissive appearance.

"It wasn't your fault," Garnet assured. "We'll get out of her somehow." And there, on the beach where too many fusions had already occurred, Pearl and Garnet combined and grew.

Meanwhile, Peridot would have seen the Homeworld ship disappear below the ocean's waves, the last lines of its attempted communications with her being that they had located her escort and informant. Unsurprisingly, with the latter of the two around, they had ended up underwater. But the question remained of why Jasper was there with her.

That was answered the minute the looming green vessel broke the surface, dragging up an equally ominous green monster. One gem above its four eyes, the other likely in its back, and with six defined arms, it fell from the spaceship's grasp about a half mile from the shore. It could easily keep its head above water just by standing, and it was marching closer.

Further from the water, a pillar of white light rose up. It dissolved into magic dragonflies when Sardonyx entered grandly from behind the curtains.

"GOODNESS ME, I'VE NEVER FELT SO ALIVE! FOUR CALLS IN TWO WEEKS?" In a lower voice, she quickly added, "And on such short notice, too."

Steven heard his dad and Connie calling to him from behind. "Don't come any closer! They're all dangerous."

"YOU CAN BET I AM. I DON'T DARESAY ANYONE WOULD WANT TO BE ON THE RECEIVING END OF SUCH A MIGHTY SWING." With that, Sardonyx brought out the red, fist- shaped hammer that was at least half as tall as she was. "BUT I WOULD DARESAY OUR LITTLE STEVEN IS IN FOR A...SMASHING PERFORMANCE!" She let out a loud and bubbly laugh. "But I'll do it GRRRRACEFULLY." Trilling her R, she took a high leap, intending to surgically land her warhammer on Steven when she came down. He jumped out of the way and rode the impact wave over to where Connie stood over him.

He jumped up and grabbed her arms. "Connie we don't have time for questions just fuse with me!"

"What? But we're not even that good at using it. We alway come apart-"

"I don't care she's gotta have something cool and we have to fight a really giant woman and whatever Amethyst turns into!" Over the whole time, the half-fusion of Peridot and Amethyst had been fighting the cable to not exist.

Hesitantly, Connie spun Steven around, trying to auralize appropriate music. She ended by holding his face under hers, and they smoothly grew into the unconventional fusion that was Stevonnie.

"Go get 'em, kids!" Greg called uncertainly. "Boy. Thing really do get out of hand with this stuff."

Stevonnie held her eyes shut as she ran across the sand, trying all she could to make some kind of weapon. She could certainly hope for a shield, which arrived quickly on her left arm.

"AND WHAT'S THIS? IT SEEMS THE LITTLE FRIEND FOUND HIS OWN FUSION FOR THE FIREFIGHT!" Again, she laughed boisterously at her own humor, before rotating the body segment that held the hammer and swinging it fully around her body. It swept a cloud up sand up, and when it cleared, Stevonnie could be seen clutching the flat face. Another surprise was that in her right hand, she'd formed a wide, straight sword, one strikingly similar to Rose Quartz's.

"OH, MY," Sardodyx exclaimed, shock behind her round shades. She brought the hammer and Stevonnie right up to them. "MARVELOUS! Do show us more." She jerked the hammer upward, sending the much smaller fusion into the air. While she tumbled, Sardonyx glanced curiously at the fusion cable, with looked puny in one of her lower hands. "But really, what is to become of this?" She tossed it in the general direction of the Amethyst/Peridot gem before leaving the conflict and setting her sights on the city again.

Stevonnie was in a free-fall. But midway through, those whip fingers reappeared and closed around the girl. The chaotic fusion finally finished. It stood tall, clothed in a deep red version of Peridot's armor on its upper half, and Amethyst's skintight pants, one leg purple, the other green. Both colors were significantly dulled. She wore a visor that bore a shape oddly similar to Sugilite's glasses, behind which were four eyes. All had pink irises. Her hair was wild, light, unkempt, but held itself in a distinct three-pointed shape. Overall, she was shaped much like Peridot, but with Amethyst's thicker aspects.

"Why don't you stay put," Tourmaline more-or-less ordered. She placed Stevonnie roughly on the beach. "This is a fight for someone bigger."

"No way! I can take her just fine!" Connie's half responded. Steven overtook and rationalized why it was better that time to let a stronger fusion tag in.

"That misshapen Sardonyx is finally gonna get what's coming to her."

A tiny-by-comparison, 75%-to-25% human-to-gem fusion sat in wonder in the sand, watching two towering aliens duke it out.

Tourmaline snapped her fingers around the handle of Sardonyx's hammer, making her jerk it back in surprise. In response, Tourmaline wrapped the whips in a coil, which shot off a steady stream of electricity. The gems stopped their duel at a light crunching sound.

Tourmaline lifted her boot. Scraps of shattered rock and crystal fell from the sole. She fell off-balance, and Amethyst and Peridot were separate again before they hit the ground.

Sardonyx blinked a few times from beneath her dark glasses. "OH, YOU POOR CHILDREN!" The pressure had finally driven Connie and Steven out of their "experience." "LOOK WHAT I'VE DRIVEN EVERYONE TO! Well, no more."

"I hope I never find one of these again," Peridot grumbled. She was interrupted by her own yelp.

Malachite cast a shadow over all of them, except Sardonyx. Her face held an evil glare in her eyes, a crazed, sharp-toothed smile, and one shining crystal nose.

"FINALLY!" she boomed. "MY CHANCE TO BREAK YOU ONCE AND FOR ALL! ROSE, TAKE YOUR LAST LOOK!"

"Jasper's in control!" Steven called to everyone.

"THERE WON'T BE A JASPER FOR LONG!" Sardonyx's hammer morphed into a spinning drill that pierced the arcing bludgeon of water coming her way. She took wide running steps to the water's edge and jumped to Malachite's face's level. As she rose, she swung her entire torso around to give the hammer some momentum, and clocked Malachite upside the jaw. The monster yelled, and, in that one moment of distraction, it looked like Lapis took her ruling position again. A liquid hand closed over Malachite's throat, and they struggled as the warship finally dragged them into the air and into a hull.

"Ha! Suckers!" Peridot stuck out her tongue at everyone one last time before vanishing into a yellow teleportation beam. The rapid-fire events left the people and gems on the beach somewhat stunned.

"WELL," Sardonyx breathed, "THAT WAS AN ADVENTURE DESERVING OF A REST. ESPECIALLY FROM FUSION." She followed her own words and fell apart into Garnet and Pearl.

"And that, Steven, is why you leave fusion alone," Pearl said. Garnet nodded her agreement. "Steven?"

"I kind of liked the rest idea," he responded, barely standing up.

"Is he going to be alright?" Greg was cautiously entering the group.

"Fusion has the potential to wear out a body, especially if it's an unstable one." Garnet knew her mood was often hard to read through a monotone and visor, so she added, "He'll be fine."

Connie stood up. "Actually, I feel great."

"Well, somebody's gotta help fix the place," Amethyst stated, flopping down next to Steven. "Not me, though. Fusion with Peridot blows." With a pause, she said, "Be funny to see her dance, though."

(This is the point when a star shape will close in on Amethyst's face.)

* * *

 **Ho-kay, well, if you know me, you may know I have a habit of prematurely posting things and then looking back and realizing certain things MUST be changed. Like Tourmaline. What did we see with Malachite? Two gems that disagreed, fused, and made a really not good fusion. So would a fusion of Peridot and Amethyst _really_ be so content? Originally I was combining Peridot's crazed mood with Amethyst's chill one, but now I'm thinking Peridot's serious instead to make something condescending and disinterested. Until she falls apart. And if you've just found this buried in time and don't know what I'm talking about, Tourmaline used to be...not well thought-out. And one final thought-sometimes I'd get a message asking why Peridot was so nice in this, and why she saved Steven that one time. Back when I wrote this I liked the idea of Peridot turning good and with recent developments...I WAS RIGHT AND I DON'T HAVE TO REWRITE THE PLOT BECAUSE PERIDOT REDEMPTION IS A-COMIN' (and don't mind that this doesn't really match up with the timeline because redemption only happens when she's living with them and this happens before that but you know)  
**


End file.
